Parents' Heterosexism and Children's Attitudes Toward People With AIds

This research examines how parental heterosexism—negative attitudes toward homosexuals and homosexuality—and other family characteristics relate to the development of children's attitudes toward people with HIV/AIDS (PWA). Attention is directed to the overall relationship between parents' and children's attitudes and to the potential mechanisms through which these linkages are manifested. Based on social learning theories of childhood socialization, a range of mechanisms is considered, focusing on heterosexist attitudes in parents and communication with children about AIDS. Findings indicate that parental attitudes concerning homosexuals influence children's attitudes toward PWA, implying that there can be negative as well as positive consequences of parents' beliefs on children's attitudes. The possibility of negative parental effects on children's prejudices toward PWA suggests that in-school HIV/AIDS education at younger ages is more important than previously thought. This research could not have been completed without the assistance of Debra Street and Isaac Eberstein. Thanks also to Janet Kistner, David Sly, and David Quadagno, co-investigators on the grant for the data collection. Final thanks to the anonymous reviewers of this manuscript. Funding support for data collection came from NIH grant #R01MH47246. Notes 1The original authoritarian personality characteristics as delineated by Adorno et al. are: (1) excessive conformity, (2) submissiveness to authority, (3) intolerance, (4) superstition, (5) insecurity, and (6) rigid, stereotypic thinking. 2Our intention was to get a diverse sample within the 600 interviews; therefore, a stratified random sample within county as well as grade, race, and gender categories was undertaken. 3In most cases, the female caregiver is the child's mother; however, there were a few cases where the child's grandmother or some other female caregiver was interviewed. For ease of description, I refer to female caregivers as mothers for the rest of the article. 4Ninety-three percent (566) of the children were re-interviewed at time two; of the 43 children who were not interviewed at time two, 34 had moved beyond our study area. Of the remaining nine children, eight could not be found; one refused to be re-interviewed. Students living in the metropolitan area were slightly more likely (n = 30) to be lost in follow-up; however, other subgroup differences are slight (see CitationQuadagno et al. 1997). 5Although re-interviewing parents would have been ideal; the challenges associated with tracking female caregivers were significant and research has shown that adult knowledge and attitudes concerning AIDS are less varied over time than children's knowledge and attitudes about AIDS. 6The reliability of many measures is lower for the first graders at time one of the study; therefore, they are excluded from the analysis (CitationSly, Eberstein, Quadagno, Kistner, Hummer, and Hussey 1992). 7The actual questions are: (1) "Homosexuality between consenting adults may be distasteful but it should not be regarded as a crime" and (2) "Homosexuals are hardly better than criminals and ought to be severely punished." Each garnered a response of either strongly agree, agree, disagree, or strongly disagree. "Neither agree nor disagree" was an available option; however, it was not read to the respondents as an option—they needed to offer it on their own. 8It is interesting to note that there were no mothers who were neutral—everyone had an opinion; therefore, it was easy to split the sample into those who reported that they believed homosexuals were and were not criminals. 9Four children were not followed up at time two; therefore the numbers (but not the percentages) for the distribution of caregivers by this measure are slightly different at time two. *Significant at the .05 level. **Significant at the .01 level. *Significant at the .05 level. **Significant at the .01 level.